


hurts

by friedgalaxies



Series: otsuchi soul [2]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, Hospitals, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Internalized Biphobia, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Secret Crush, Unrequited Crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:28:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25762921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/friedgalaxies/pseuds/friedgalaxies
Summary: shikamaru nara isn’t scared. shikamaru nara isn’t in love.(he is, and he is.)
Relationships: Akimichi Chouji & Nara Shikamaru & Yamanaka Ino, Akimichi Chouji/Nara Shikamaru, Nara Shikamaru & Sarutobi Asuma, Nara Shikamaru & Yamanaka Ino
Series: otsuchi soul [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1843909
Comments: 4
Kudos: 43





	hurts

Shikamaru Nara doesn’t worry. He doesn’t.

(He does, he worries so much, he worries so hard it hurts.)

Shikamaru Nara doesn’t worry, and he definitely doesn’t sit outside the room where his best friend is currently having the remnants of Something being purged from his body by seals so intricate they make his head spin.

(He does, and he is. He’s sitting on a cold metal bench outside the room where Chouji lays in a circle ten times his size, almost as big as he grew during that fight, during that fucking firefight with the first of the Sound Four, where Shikamaru left him like a coward and kept going because it was for the good of the mission.

Good of the mission his ass. For the sake of Sasuke, his ass.

Fuck Sasuke and fuck his defection and fuck the Sound Four, because his best friend is unconscious and having his body purged and no one knows if he’s going to wake up or not because you aren’t supposed to get to the red candy, you’re supposed to stop before then, but the container in Chouji’s pocket was empty and Uncle Chouza’s face had gone pale when he saw it.)

Shikamaru doesn’t worry, because he knows it's all going to turn out alright. He definitely hadn’t run from the hospital room as soon as he’d been healed, almost too soon for the medi-nin to give him the all clear and far too soon to attend a briefing he didn’t want to attend in the first place because that was his best friend in there.

(The funny thing about dying is that it doesn’t feel like you are until you are.

The funny thing about it is that Shikamaru feels like he’s dying. He wasn’t even hurt that badly, he barely suffered more than some scrapes and bruises and a deep scratch over his temple that he’d had to have stitched up and damn it stung looking in the mirror just over the medi-nin’s shoulder and seeing that the careful line of stitches was right in the same place as one of his father’s scars.

The funny thing about it is that Shikamaru feels like he’s dying because his best friend is, he’s sure of it. The funny thing about it is that before now, Shikamaru never believed in destiny or soulmates or fate or anything like that, but now he’s deeply, truly sure that some part of his soul has been hollowed out for a chunk of Chouji’s own to fit neatly inside, like puzzle pieces finally clicking together after hours spent trying to match cardboard edges that just won’t snap together no matter how hard you force it. The funny thing about dying is that Shikamaru is so, so sure he is.

The funny thing about dying is that Shikamaru is sitting outside a hospital room on a cold metal bench with his head in his hands and hoping beyond hope that his best friend isn’t.)

Shikamaru has never done well with solitude, despite all the time that he spends alone. He’s never done well with solitude and it’s never so clear as when he’s sitting in an empty hospital hallway and waiting for his best friend to wake up.

He thinks about Ino. He thinks about what he would be doing if this same situation were happening to Ino, and he doesn’t have an answer for himself because he earnestly doesn’t know. He doesn’t have an answer because in any situation where the same thing is happening to Ino the key component is that it isn’t happening to Chouji, and Chouji is with him, and he isn’t alone. He isn’t alone and Chouji is with him and he loves Ino, he really does, loves her twice as much as he would love any blood sister, but he doesn’t know what he’d do if it were Ino having her chakra purged in the middle of a seal ten times her size.

He thinks about what would happen if it were Ino in there, and the only thought that comes to mind is that Chouji wouldn’t be.

His mouth tastes like iron and bitter, bitter selfishness.

He isn’t sure how much time passes, other than the fact that his legs have gone numb all the way down to the floor and his tailbone hurts from sitting still for so long and he’s pretty sure he nearly fell asleep at one point, because the next thing that registers in his addled mind is a bright flash of blond and Ino’s warm upper arm pressing against his own.

“Hey.” she says.

“Hey.” he says back. His mouth tastes like sleep and blood.

“He’s gonna be okay, you know.” Ino says, and she sounds so sure of herself that Shikamaru can’t help but believe it.

“I know.” he says.

(He knows, but he doesn’t know, because there’s a voice in the back of his head constantly whispering its doubts. Doubt that Chouji will wake up. Doubt that Chouji will wake up unscathed. Doubt that Chouji will wake up unscathed and whole enough to be a shinobi. Doubt that Chouji will wake up and won’t blame him for ending his career as a shinobi because it was his fault, it was his fault because Shikamaru was team leader and he was supposed to look out for them and he was supposed to take the first hit and he-

Doubt that Chouji will wake up.)

Ino snorts, leaning her weight against him to the point where he concedes to it with a grunt and presses his own weight against the wall instead of huddling over his knees like a man in prayer. He’s not a particularly religious man, has not been and likely never will be, but leaning over his knees with hands folded and eyes closed feels like a balm to a wound that he cannot see.

“How are you doing?” Ino asks. Shikamaru swallows.

“Fine.” he says, even though it’s clear as day that he isn’t. Ino frowns, leaning harder into him, resting her sharp chin on his shoulder.

“Don’t lie to me.” she says. Her chin pokes into the meat of his shoulder when she talks. He winces with each word.

“You could cut open field rations with that thing, anyone ever tell you that?” he says, because firing her up is easier than facing the truth, like it always is. Firing her up, turning the subject around and around till the arrow isn’t pointed at him anymore, just another one of his tactics in the great tactician’s mind every Nara worth their salt is blessed with. She scowls, now, but she turns her head so her cheek is pressed against his shoulder instead and Shikamaru silently counts it as a win that she’s not boring into his soul with those all-knowing blue eyes of hers anymore.

“Don’t evade the question, Shika. How are you doing?” she asks, and it’s much more forceful this time, to the point where he feels compelled to answer.

“Horrible.” he croaks, like his mouth is moving on it’s own, and for a minute he wonders if her kekkai genkai changed since he saw her last and transformed into the ability to get people to say what they’re really thinking.

“Good.”

“‘Good’? Glad to know my suffering is entertaining for you, Yamanaka.”

“You know that’s not what I meant. I meant it’s good you’re finally accepting your own emotions, for once.”

“No, I didn’t know, because you’re a cryptic bitch who talks me in circles all the time. I’m starting to think you hate me, specifically.”

Ino removes herself from his shoulder but keeps an arm braced on his elbow, like if she doesn’t keep some of her weight pressing down on him he’ll disappear entirely (he just might.)

“Shikamaru. You’re way too smart for this. Stop playing games with me.”

“That’s awful rich,” he says, “coming from you.”

“You love him.” she says instead, and all of a sudden it feels like the air is getting sucked out of his chest and replaced with poison gas. His voice sounds distant and far away to his own ears, even as he attempts to lie to one of two people who will always, always see through it no matter what, and it stings because the other person in that exclusive club is somewhere between living and dead on the other side of that door.

“Of course I love him,” he says, because it’s true. Ino frowns, bringing her other hand up to the back of his head and forcing him to look at her. Her fingers are cold and rough on the nape of his neck, whispers of jet black baby hairs tangled up around her knuckles.

“No, you _love him_ love him. Love him how Asuma loves Kurenai, love him. Love him like a boyfriend, love him, not like a brother.”

It’s a testament to all his years of ninja training that Shikamaru doesn’t throw her off (if he was even strong enough for that) and bolt for the hospital doors at that very moment. He feels far away from his own body, like he’s staring down at himself from the outside, like someone has cast a genjutsu on him and he’s rewatching the top ten most terrifying moments of his life replay before his very own eyes.

“Ino.” he says instead, quietly, pleadingly. “Ino, I….”

“It’s okay,” she says, even though it’s not, because strong men don’t love other men. Strong men, Nara men, don’t love other men like that. Nara men wouldn’t sacrifice themselves for another man. Nara men wouldn’t tangle up beneath the sheets of a single bed and stare at another man’s face as he sleeps, glad that he’s breathing and alive and no happier to spend that moment with another man. Nara men don’t have puppydog crushes on the boy they’ve been raised alongside since before birth, and Nara men don’t love other men.

(He loves a boy. He loves a boy so much it hurts. He loves a boy it hurts like when his mother brings her hand down sharp and hard on his cheek and gives him a bruise that lasts for days, because he asked about the two chuunin that man the gate and why people give them such dirty looks when they hold hands. He loves a boy so much it hurts like when his mother grabs his skinny, five-year-old upper arm and drags him away from the television where two men have just kissed like a man and a woman would. He loves a boy so much it hurts like his mother screaming that he better not turn out that way, that his disgusting teacher better not teach him to fuck men, kiss men, love men.

He loves a boy so much it burns like the hot, hot shame in his face and in his gut as his mother screams at his teacher after class, screams at Iruka-sensei for teaching him what gay people are and corrupting her son and turning him gay. He loves a boy so much it burns like the hot water his mother threatens him with if he turns out like One Of Those Men. He loves a boy so much it burns like the bobbing end of Asuma-sensei’s cigarette as he swallows uncomfortably, clearing his throat around the question Shikamaru just asked, clearing his throat around the sideways look Shikamaru gave him when he asked about the wedding two of the tokubetsu jounin had celebrated last week, the wedding Asuma had mentioned off-handedly.

“Why did they get married?” Asuma repeated, ashing his cigarette in the little crystal dish he kept on the table on his front porch. Shikamaru nodded.

“Well, son, they got married because they love each other.” Asuma said, like it was the simplest thing in the world.

Burns like shame and hurts like fear.

“I didn’t know people like that loved each other.” Shikamaru intoned stiffly. He’d stopped rocking in the weathered rocking chairs Asuma kept on his porch, Asuma planting his feet on the wooden slats that made up the floor of the porch and ceasing his motion where he sat in its twin. Asuma arched a brow.

“‘People like that’?” he asked. Shikamaru nodded, and how much younger he’d been then, even though it couldn’t have been but a few months ago. How he’d assumed his sensei had grown up like he had, knew the reel of pain and heat and hatred that ran in the front of Shikamaeu’s skull at all times like a film, how he’d been so naive even with all his genius.

“People like what, son?” Asuma asked. Shikamaru’s hands shook.

“Sinners.” he whispered.

Asuma’s face turned soft, softer than Shikamaru had ever seen it. “Oh, Shikamaru. Oh, kid.”

He loved a boy it burnt so much like the shame in his gut when his sensei leveled that knowing look at him.

He loves a boy so much it hurt.)

“You don’t understand, Ino.” he says, because that was easier than explaining why he couldn’t love Chouji, why he didn’t want Chouji to get hurt, why he loved Chouji too much to Love him, love him publicly, because Uncle Chouza was a good, kind man but he didn’t want Chouji to get hurt by that secret Akimichi temper because Shikamaru Loved him.

“Then tell me. Explain to me what I don’t understand.” she demands, grip tightening where her hands still clutch his elbow, the nape of his neck. He swallows against the fear and panic rising in his throat like bile, all acidic and twice as bitter.

“I can’t.” he whispers. Her face softens, like Asuma’s had, and the pity in it felt disgusting on his skin.

“Oh, Shikamaru—“ she starts, and he knew she would’ve continued if it hadn’t been for the doors opening and a team of medi-nin wheeling Chouji out on a hospital bed, his hair loose and lank around his face like a lion’s mane. Shikamaru stands so fast Ino wheels in place to keep from losing her balance, and it was only because of that that she was a second slower than him to rush to Chouji’s bedside, keeping pace with the medi-nin as they walked down the hospital hallways.

“Is he okay?” Shikamaru breathes. One of the medi-nin exchanges a look with another before leveling him with a soft smile and why is everyone looking at Shikamaru with such softness in their face and in their voice when he doesn’t deserve it, when he’s never deserved it?

“He’ll be fine,” the medi-nin says, and Shikamaru feels his heart start beating again.

Shikamaru loves a boy so much it hurts. He loves a boy so much it hurts but that boy is okay, and the hurt doesn’t matter, because the hurt from his love is nothing compared to the hurt he would’ve felt if Chouji had died.

Shikamaru loves a boy so much it hurts, and that’s okay, because he’s okay.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading! i hope you enjoyed the third installment in this series and a look inside shikamaru’s head! most of the other works will be from chouji’s perspective as per usual, but this idea would Not leave me alone haha. as always, questions, concrit, and concerns are always welcome in the comments! i hope you’re all staying safe <3


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